Shattering the Israel Taboo: Why American Jews Are Protesting Netanyahu at the UN -
The stretch of land bordering the East River between 42nd and 48th streets in Midtown Manhattan contains an emotional reservoir of Jewish history. The United Nations, founded in the wake of the Second World War and the Holocaust, holds deeply resonant and mixed memories for most American Jews.
It was the UN General Assembly (at the time based in Queens) that approved the 1947 partition plan and subsequently welcomed Israel into its ranks. However, as the Cold War heated up and more postcolonial states joined the organization’s ranks, the UN became an increasingly hostile environment for Israel. For many pro-Israel Jews, those very initials became a metonym for perceived global hatred of the Jewish state.
Following the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, after which Israel occupied land claimed by three Arab nations (in addition to millions of stateless Palestinians), the Soviet Union and its allies ramped up official anti-Zionism in international institutions. This is the period of UN history in which Israel's foreign minister at the time, Abba Eban, reportedly quipped: "If Algeria introduced a resolution declaring that the earth was flat and that Israel had flattened it, it would pass by a vote of 164 to 13 with 26 abstentions."
Then came the infamous 1975 resolution declaring Zionism to be a form of racism, preceded by a flurry of statements and resolutions in UN committees and conferences that tied Zionism to the sundry ills of the world: racism, sexism, Western imperialism, and economic exploitation of the Global South. This international campaign coincided with the New Left’s sharp turn against Israel and Zionism.
Amid these ultimately failed efforts to isolate Israel, American Jews always stuck by Israeli leaders at the UN, which makes what's unfolding ahead of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's scheduled address there Friday so extraordinary: a daily wave of noisy protests by American Jews following the prime minister during his stay in Manhattan. A mix of American and Israeli Jews chanted "Shame!" on Tuesday as he slipped into his hotel, excoriating his government’s assault on Israeli democracy. Hundreds of whistling and “democracy!" chanting demonstrators also protested outside Netanyahu’s Wednesday meeting with President Joe Biden, whom Netanyahu hopes will foot the bill for a normalization agreement with Saudi Arabia.
Protesters wave flags and chant slogans near the site of a planned meeting between United States President Joe Biden and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York, Wednesday.Credit: Seth Wenig /AP
The annual September meeting of the UN General Assembly has always provided an opportunity for an Israeli leader to reach a global audience, an enormously consequential platform paralleled only by the coveted joint address to the United States Congress. Historically, it is on these occasions that Netanyahu has most sought to shape himself into a “leader of the Jewish people” standing between world Jewry and its enemies. It's no coincidence that Netanyahu first rose to international attention as Israel’s representative to the UN. In Israel and in pro-Israel Jewish communities in the diaspora, the person holding this post is often seen as manning the diplomatic front line.
For decades, most American Jews rallied to the cause of Israel whenever it faced censure at the UN. In 1974, an estimated 150,000 to 200,000 people amassed in front of the UN to protest the appearance of Palestine Liberation Organization chairman Yasser Arafat. The Zionism is racism resolution likewise galvanized American Jews to support Israel, turning Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Chaim Herzog into icons for the community. When the International Court of Justice was deliberating on the legality of Israel’s separation barrier in 2004, more than 600 Jewish high school students rallied to support Israel. In more recent years, the appearance of vociferous anti-Israel figures at the assembly, especially former Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, was always a cause for denouncing the UN as a club of hateful dictators and extolling Israel’s democratic virtues by contrast.
This week, in a necessary and overdue correction, the UN is now a center of American Jewish opposition to an Israeli government. In solidarity with protesters in Israel, who have been demonstrating weekly in mass protests across the country since the judicial overhaul was announced in January, American Jews are picketing the local appearances of visiting Israeli government officials attending the UN General Assembly. It's not the first time American Jews have protested in recent months—Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, Diaspora Minister Amichai Chikli and far-right lawmaker Simcha Rothman can attest to that—but this week’s actions carry immense historical weight.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu prepares to sign a guest book as he meets with United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres during the 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly at U.N. headquarters, Wednesday.Credit: Craig Ruttle /AP
On Friday, when Netanyahu stands before the world and warns of supposedly existential dangers Israel now faces from a host of enemies, there will be American Jews demonstrating against him just outside. In their ideological diversity they will represent the majority of American Jews: moderate Zionist Jews who primarily oppose this current coalition and for whom protesting an Israeli government is an entirely new and radical act; liberal and left-wing Zionists who have vocally opposed Netanyahu since at least the Obama administration; and non- and anti-Zionist Jews, some of whom will wave Palestinian flags in what will be a sea of blue and white.
The impetus for this extraordinary protest is, of course, the Netanyahu government’s ongoing judicial coup. According to a Jewish Electorate Institute poll in June, 61 percent of American Jews who have heard of it think it will weaken Israel’s democracy.
The bulk of the protesters are passionately pro-Israel. As critics on the left frequently note, most of the Israeli demonstrators have not spoken out when Palestinians have been the victims of the state’s caprice. This is probably even more so the case with many of the American Jews taking to the streets in solidarity. During my recent excursions to pro-democracy solidarity protests outside the Israeli consulate in Manhattan and in Washington Square Park, I have definitely recognized a few of my fellow longtime agitators; but for the most part, the participants are ordinary American Jews who never would have dreamed of protesting an Israeli government until January.
Yet it would be a mistake to conclude that these developments are transient and that American Jewish liberals will simply return to business as usual after this crisis concludes. First, if more elements of the judicial coup are enacted, this oppositional tack will surely intensify in tandem with the protest movement in Israel. If the law changing the composition of the Judicial Appointments Committee is passed, effectively giving the governing coalition carte blanche to appoint to the judiciary whomever it pleases, it will be viewed in the American Jewish community as a fatal blow to what remained of Israel’s liberal democratic character.
But even if the current government’s plan is thwarted, and Netanyahu finally leaves the public scene for good, a sacred cow has been slaughtered in plain sight.
Masses of American Jews not only protested an Israeli prime minister but will have done so in a location that was formerly a cause for unifying behind Israeli governments. The fact that most of these American Jewish demonstrators are not radical is, in fact, what is so radically significant about this moment.
By appearing as friends of Israel and wielding the flag against the Israeli government, they are intently separating their love of the country from the political pronouncements of the state’s leadership. By making this demonstration in front of the UN, they are recognizing what many of us have said for years: the paramount threat to Israel’s future comes not from Palestinians or Iran, but rather from a domestic Jewish far-right that seeks to make the occupation permanent and turn Israel into an apartheid state. The Israeli judiciary, while usually deferential to the state on the occupation, has stood in the way of those goals.
An aerial view shows people taking part in a demonstration against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his nationalist coalition government's judicial overhaul plan in Jerusalem this month.Credit: ILAN ROSENBERG/ REUTERS
So it was no surprise that Netanyahu this week turned to the issue of security to tar the protesters, saying they would be “joining forces” with Israel’s enemies, citing the PLO and Iran. The furious reaction to these comments suggests they were immediately recognized as a cheap attempt at emotional manipulation. Far from working to Netanyahu’s benefit, they may even contribute to more American Jews turning out on Friday.
The symbolism of pro-Israel American Jews demonstrating against an Israeli prime minister in front of the UN, with spiritual leaders of the community speaking from the dais, is uniquely powerful; it will not and should not be forgotten by activists working to push the community’s more liberal institutions to take a proactive stance against the occupation and for equality between Jewish and Palestinian citizens of Israel.
There is now a “mainstream” precedent for setting aside the security rhetoric of Israeli political leaders and recognizing that anti-democratic currents in the country must be confronted without hesitation. It is incumbent on progressives to recognize the magnitude of these historic protests and drive our message home. Democracy in Israel will never be secure as long as the right’s dream of permanent dictatorship in the occupied territories and Jewish supremacy remains viable.
Abe Silberstein is the Associate Director, North America, at The Abraham Initiatives. The views expressed here are his own.